War of Angels MMO Launching in North America

Well the MMO news is out – War of Angels is launching in North America through WizGames. If the name WizGames sounds a bit familiar to you, it’s because they’re the same company who developed S4 League – a sci-fi themed third person MMO shooter which Alaplaya currently publishes. Seeing a game developer like WizGames launching a game is interesting, as WizGames might eventually launch more of their products in North America. I had a chance to play War of Angels in its closed beta on the Gamigo service and after playing the game for a few hours I really liked it. The only problem was I was worried that Gamigo may not have the North American license for the game, which would mean I couldn’t play the game on their service – only those in Europe could. Now than a WizGames announced that they would be publishing the game in North America, I’m a bit relieved. The reason I was concerned is because Gamigo pulled the old bait-and-switch tactic with their other game – Martial Empires. In the game’s open beta anyone anywhere in the world could play it, but after the game launched the company had put IP blocks into the game preventing those living Outside of Europe from connecting to the game. The reason they had to do this was because the Korean developer, CR Space, only sold Gamigo the European license to the game. The North American license was sold to another company – who never actually launched the game. So even though I want to play Martial Empires, I can’t because the game is EU only.

Gamigo isn’t the only company who had to put IP restrictions in one of their popular MMORPGs because of licensing agreements. Gpotato had to ban all IP addresses outside of North America from connecting to their Aika Online game. Many people outside of North America wanted to play Aika, but they couldn’t because gPotato had blocked all foreign IP addresses. It wasn’t until T3Fun, the game publisher behind WYD Global, launched Aika Online world-wide 6 months later that people outside of North America could play the game. The thing is, because of MMORPG licensing agreements on occasion never get released in certain regions. For example – Priston Tale 2 was licensed to Suba Games in North America and GamerKraft in Europe. The European version launched a year ago, but the North American Version through Suba Games hasn’t and no release date has been announced. Anyone in the United States or Canada who wishes to play Priston Tale 2 cannot because the GamerKraft version is only available to residents in the European Union. Suba Games also publishes Ace Online, Mission Against Terror and Fragoria in North America while GamerKraft publishes FreeJack. Another thing about licensing is that games may release in different regions at different times. Nexon released Vindictus in North America on October 13, but the EU version isn’t scheduled to release for another 3 months. Those living in the EU are upset, and rightfully so. Why should they have to wait 3+ months for a clearly finished product to launch in their region?

Anyway, enough licensing talk. I’m just glad that War of Angels is actually going to launch in the U.S, and I think many other gamers are too. The thing about Gamigo is that you can never really tell if their games are going to be EU Only or EU and U.S. They publish Fiesta Online and Project Powder in EU only, but they have King of Kings 3 and Black Prophecy in BOTH the EU and U.S. So if they release a new game, just hold you breath and hope that it’ll be playable in the U.S.